The Glass Castle Essay Example for Free

The Glass Castle Essay The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls is an extremely shocking novel in that even it weren’t true the events in the story would still be shocking, but the fact that it is true makes it that much more disturbing. In the book Jeannette is on more than one occasion, a victim of sexual abuse. Although there is one event in particular that I found exceptionally troubling. And that is when Jeannette and her family are in their upper class house in Phoenix and innocently leave their doors and windows open. One night, random perverts sneak into their home and sexually assault the children. And it wouldn’t be so bad if Jeannette didn’t play it off as though it were nothing. She almost makes it seem like barely mentioning when she says that â€Å" I was awakened by someone running his hands over my private parts†(103). And the man who assaulted her had a book â€Å"with pictures of boys and girls wearing only underpants†(103). From the eyes of someone like I, who can make no connection with perverts other than the horrific news stories of rape and murder I occasionally hear about, this event is tremendously disturbing. When I read this part of the book I thought she was in mortal danger. I’ve never actually heard of someone sexually assaulting a child without it involving some sort of murder or kidnapping. It really goes to show she is familiar with perverts and wrongfully – or rightfully I’m not really sure – does not feel an extreme panic type of danger when dealing with pedophiles. This event teaches Jeannette what is really worth worrying about. After Rex and Jeannette go out she realizes this is like hunting Demon, â€Å" except the enemy was real and dangerous instead being the product of a kid’s overactive imagination. (103)† And it goes to show that a big reason why Jeannette is so mature and matures so quickly is due to the fact of her constant experience of traumatizing events and moments of extreme danger.

The Repetitive, Meditative Style of Lawrences Birds, Beasts, and Flowe

The Repetitive, Meditative Style of Lawrence's Birds, Beasts, and Flowers D. H. Lawrence is not a formalist. He derives his free verse style from prolonged experience with imaginative essays in which he objectively and vividly contemplates things, people, and places in their singleness rather than in their relationship to each other. Lawrence's purpose, according to Gilbert, is "knowledge through meditation": he essays "to know something . . . intuitively . . . obliquely . . . fragmentarily; not through orderly ratiocination, but through emotional perception." As his style developed, Lawrence's essays became "increasingly idiosyncratic, increasingly elliptical, spontaneous and jazzy, as though reflecting the process rather than the product of thought." Gilbert finds Birds, Beasts, and Flowers, Lawrence's sixth volume of poetry, written in a "casual, improvisational, unfinished style" that "functions not only as a means of communication but [also] as a process of discovery" (131-32). Building on Gilbert's studies, an examination of "Fruits," the first sequence of the nine-part Birds, Beasts, and Flowers, reveals that Lawrence's repetitive, meditative style employs three types of repetition. "Fruits," an archetypal sequence about eating fruit and being changed by its magical properties, admits readers into Lawrence's meditations and his Blakeian journey to the natural world (Gilbert 333). The poet/narrator tantalizes his prissy countrymen by suggestively dangling fruits that hold "a secret that can be experienced with the senses, but cannot be grasped intellectually" (Lockwood 105). Lawrence accomplishes his poetic journey through revisions of myths. The opening poem, "Pomegranate," which alludes to the myth of Pers... ...h life with "family and friends" (Unterecker 241). Works Cited French, Roberts W. "Lawrence and American Poetry." The Legacy of D. H. Lawrence, Jeffrey Meyers, ed. New York: St. Martin's P, 1987. 109-34. Gilbert, Sandra M. Acts of Attention: The Poems of D. H. Lawrence. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1990. Lawrence, D. H. Birds, Beasts, and Flowers. New York: Thomas Seltzer, 1923. Lockwood, M. J. A Study of the Poems of D. H. Lawrence: Thinking in Poetry. Houndsmills, England: MacMillan P, 1987. Murfin, Ross C. The Poetry of D. H. Lawrence: Texts and Contexts. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1983. Unterecker, John. "Of Father, of Son: On "Fergus Falling," "After Making Love We Hear Footsteps," and Angling, a Day." On the Poetry of Galway Kinnell: The Wages of Dying, Howard Nelson, ed. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 1987. 227-41.

Encountering Conflict Essay

When confronted with conflict, peoples moral centre can cause them to act in heroic ways. When we are exposed to war and devastation our reactions to this†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ Thousands of Chinese students gathered in a peaceful protest for basic Democratic reform at Tiannaman Square 1984. Due to these actions they were senselessly and inhumanely killed in cold blood by the Chinese Military. The students were unarmed and in no way of a danger to anyone. This devastation shocked the world and erupted massive conflict. One thing that this devastation proved to the world that during times of conflict where ones moral compass is tested there true heroism is revealed. A small, unexceptional figure in pants and white shirt, looking tiny next to the hulking tanks, carrying what looks to be his shopping, positions himself before an approaching tank, with a line of 17 more tanks behind it. The tank swerves right, he moves in front again. The tank swerves left, he moved in front again. Then this anonymous bystander climbs up onto the vehicle of war and says something to its driver, â€Å"Why are you here? My city is in chaos because of you.† With a single act of defiance, a lone Chinese hero revived the world’s image of courage. He was the â€Å"unknown rebel† also know as the Tanks Man a man who was immensely courageous and a beacon of hope. The courage that it took to walk out against such massive machinery, knowing good and well that it could very well be your last day on this earth is inspiring. He took courage to a whole new level, becoming a world hero of sorts. This ordinary everyday man had stood up to one of largest of armies which was an undeniably, extraordinary act. Another man who stood up for what he believed in response to such brutal and callous acts was a man named Bradley Manning. A man who new his moral obligation was to show the world what the Government was hiding from them. Manning was an American soldier and as apart of his job he has witnessed such cruel and inhuman acts performed by the military that the world were unaware of. Manning new what was right, his response to this conflict was to present this information to the world. Manning fulfilled his legal duty which was to report war crimes. He complied with his legal duty to obey lawful orders but also his duty to disobey unlawful orders. An order not to reveal classified information that  contains evidence of war crimes would be an unlawful act. Manning had the legal duty to reveal the commission of war crime. Manning revealed to the world, the unjust detachment of Guantanamo Bay, he revealed the human cost of wars in Iraq through the â€Å"Collateral Murder† video which depicts U.S forces in a helicopter killing unarmed civilians. The video even showed men trying to rescue the wounded who then were shot down as well. Manning had sent this information to a website called Wiki Leaks; a website created by Julian Assange in order to reveal to the world the truth about our leaders and what they are not telling us. Manning has been held 19 months in military custody. Manning has been held in solitary confinement 23 hours a day. He is only allowed to walk one hour a day in shackles. When he sleeps he is not allowed to between 5AM and 8PM weekdays and 7AM and 8PM on weekends. If he tries to he was made to sit up or stand by guards. The goal was simple the Government want to make Manning an example to other potential whistleblowers and wanted to seek to, pressure Manning into an admission that wikileaks solicited material from him, making that organization and Julian Assange part of a criminal conspiracy. Manning was a hero. This ordinary man, a solider witnessed cruel and brutal acts that the Government were hiding and presented it rightfully to the world â€Å"I want people to see the truth†. For these extraordinary actions he has been humiliated and inhumanely tortured. When our moral center is tested, ordinary inadvertent individuals who act in miraculous and extraordinary ways are revealed. Manning was tested. His moral obligation and his legal duty was to present these war crimes to the world. Conflict can stir emotions, including emotions of hatred, fear and protection of ones self and loved ones at the expense of anyone or anything else. As a result, people may act in irrational ways causing them to abandon their moral values for something that is inhumane and amoral. In times of conflict often people are fighting for there ideologies. In these times people who can lose there touch with reality and who’s blind devotion to the belief causes them to act in ways they normally wouldn’t. However, people who don’t think of the morality of there actions and are blind to the suffering there actions cause, they perform the most extraordinary acts that are the most  dangerous. The ‘Quiet American‘ written by Graham Green explores how in times of conflict peoples moral obligation for what is wrong and right is truly tested. The character in the novel Alden Pyle is a man used to provide readers with an American who is strong commitment to democracy in Vietnam has caused him to have a false conception of the world. Pyle with the intentions of saving Vietnam from the grasp of Communism in the process killed many innocent civilians in the name of what he believed was right, democracy. Through the character Fowler, we can see through his reactions to the devastation to the human impact of the bombings that emphasizes the cruelness and naivety of Pyle. Fowler witnesses the Bombings at Place Garnier, in fowlers words â€Å"what I remembered was the torso in the square, the baby on its mothers lap. They had not been warned: they had not been sufficiently important†. The horrific scenes Fowler describes presents Pyle as inhuman. Fowlers reaction to the devastation emphasizes on Pyle’s reactions as callous and brutal. We see this when Pyle uses a dismissive tone, â€Å"they were just war casualties †, as he shows no remorse for those who he has killed. Pyle again dismisses the deaths in saying â€Å"we are looking after the relatives†. To Pyle the actions that have occurred are for the good of the majority, these deaths lost are necessary for everyone. Pyle is blinded by his ideology of democracy and he remains untouched by the human suffering around him. Its not necessarily the good extraordinary acts that people can respond to conflict with but we can make the wrong choices and we question our morals and beliefs. Times of turmoil can bring out the worst in people and they can make the wrong decisions. In Harper Lees novel, To Kill a Mocking Bird, Bob Ewell is fueled by his hatred for the African Americans and is only concerned about power. He uses his position as being above African Americans so that people believe him and his family are more than white trash. He does this by accusing Tom Robinson of raping his daughter. We see here how someone can respond negatively to conflict, this conflict being racism and lack of civil rights during the 1930‘s. Ewell during this conflict, doesnt look to his heart or conscience. He doesn’t care if an innocent man is executed, he is run by purely selfish motives. We see a different response in times of intense circumstances, how someone so evil and cruel can fakley accuse a man for his own benefits. A man who just as Pyle was, is oblivious to the suffering but in order to follow his beliefs  he must be immune to the suffering.

Essay on American Slavery - 2920 Words

American Slavery Between 1830 and 1860, a time of increasing national divisions over slavery, numerous accounts of slave life were published. These accounts of life under slavery almost invariably had either abolitionist or pro slavery agendas. Slaves in the ante-bellum South lived under a wide variety of circumstances, and held a variety of positions, including household servant, wagon driver, iron foundry workers and skilled artisan. Nine out of ten slaves however, worked as farm laborers, growing cotton, tobacco, rice, and other products. About half of these laborers worked on large plantations of twenty slaves or more, while the others worked on smaller and poorer farms, often alongside their master. Patterns of life on†¦show more content†¦Then he must work all day, cold or hot, from week’s end to week’s end. Slaves have one pair of shoes for the year; if these become worn out in two months, they get no more that year, but must go barefooted the rest of the year, through cold and heat. The shoes are very poor ones, made by one of the slaves, and do not last more than two or three months. They get one pair of stockings for the year. They have one suit of clothes for the year. This is very poor, and made by the slaves themselves on the plantation. It will not last more than three months, and then the slave gets no more from the slave holder, if he go naked. This suit consists of one shirt, one pair of pants, one pair of socks, one pair of shoes, and no vest at all. The slave has a hat given to him once in two years. â€Å"No beds are given to the slaves to sleep on; if they have any they found it themselves.† â€Å" A physician in Alabama wrote in the Southern Cultivator in 1850: One of the most prolific sources of disease among Negroes is the condition of there houses.... Small, low, tight and filthy; there houses can be but laboratories of disease. (Rogers 8) †Every Saturday night , the slaves receive two pounds of bacon, and one peck and a half of corn meal, to last the men through the week. The women have one half pound of meat, and one peck of corn meal. The children, one half peck of each. When this mere food is gone they have noShow MoreRelatedAmerican Slavery, American Freedom Essay1174 Words   |  5 PagesEdmund S. Morgan’s famous novel American Slavery, American Freedom was published by Norton in 1975, and since then has been a compelling scholarship in which he portrays how the first stages of America began to develop and prosper. Within his researched narrative, Morgan displays the question of how society with the influence of the leaders of the American Revolution, could have grown so devoted to human freedom while at the same time conformed to a system of labor that fully revoked human dignityRead MoreAmerican Slavery1079 Words   |  5 Pagespopulation increased. Planters turned to African slaves to replace the white servants, in this manner elevated the status of poor whites. There were three structural changes: the decline of opportunity, the beginnings of natural increase, and the rise of slavery. By 1680 tobacco prices declined so much that planters earned barely enough income to recover their costs of production, and tobacco prices went below that level. But in 1740 the tobacco prices began to rise, however not having the tobacco boomRead MoreJustification of American Slavery2267 Words   |  10 Pagesearly 1600s, the majority of Indentured Servants were Native Americans. 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